Nicaragua travel tips

Nicaragua is definitely on our “go now” list. The country is making eco travel and adventure travel headlines, showing off a small but impressive crop of new luxury hotels that could hold their own anywhere in the world, and producing some of the best rum on the planet. It remains very, very affordable, it’s not yet over run by travelers, and it’s one of the safest countries in Central America. Here we go.

Nicaragua for food lovers

Nicaragua consistently served up the coldest beer we had in Central America and it seems to be a point of pride to only sever beer that’s truly bien fria. Sometimes the glass was frosty too and the refrigerators in most bars and stores had stickers on them promising beer under 0 degrees C (32 F). That’s noticeably colder than the norm in other neighboring countries. Also, it’s practically unpatriotic to hike up the price of a cold Toña, the national beer of Nicaragua, so the price doesn’t vary by much (it’s a little more than US$1 per liter) whether you buy it in the supermarket or at a fancy bar.

Nicaragua is not a foodie destination but two local dishes you’ll be grateful for are fritanga, usually served from basic street vendors and including a grilled meat, gallo pinto (spiced beans and rice), and a small salad. The best fritanga in the country, if you ask us, is found in the town of Masaya.

The best fritanga we had in Nicaragua looked like this in the town of Masaya.

Vigoron is another national dish which will please pork lovers with succulent pork cubes and chicharron (fried pork skin with some meat still on) served over cooked yucca slathered with a vinegary cabbage salad.

Vigaron in Nicaragua.

Then there are street snacks like guiliras which are made with sweet corn masa cooked on a griddle between squares of banana leaves. They’re like a cross between a thick tortilla and corn bread and they taste great on their own or served servicio with a hunk of salty cheese called cuajada on top. Guiliras are not found everywhere. In fact, the only place we ever saw them was in Matagalpa, so snag ’em when you see ’em.

At the Flor de Caña rum distillery in Nicaragua.

Award-winning Flor de Caña rum is proudly made in Nicaragua and is even cheaper in most stores than it is in the Duty Free shops at the borders, especially when it’s on sale which is often. The distillery is located just north of León where they offer a guided tour. See why you should sign up in our story about this fun and informative distillery tour.

Nicaraguans are crazy about beets which turn up in salads all the time and are even used to tint and flavor white rice.

Driving in Nicaragua road trip tips

Nicaragua has far better roads than Costa Rica and most of their other Central American neighbors as well thanks to serious petroleum contributions from fellow socialist country Venezuela (petroleum is a key ingredient in asphalt). There are still some dreadful stretches of road through small towns, so don’t get lulled into a false sense of smoothness.

Nicaraguans are also crazy about paving roads using interlocking cement bricks instead of black top. We suspect this has something to do with the fact that relatives of politicians own paving brick companies, but maybe that’s just us. Anyway, when done well, it’s a pleasure to drive on roads paved this way and if a pothole develops workers can just replace the broken/missing bricks by interlocking new ones into place.

Pedestrians, pedi-cabs, horse-drawn carriages, and cyclists rule the road and will not move for you even if you’re driving a great big pickup truck like ours.

You must have local liability insurance to drive in Nicaragua, but the best advice is to simply not have an accident. We were told that in Nicaragua if you have an accident in which blood is drawn you go to jail until the official fine is worked out and until a personal settlement (usually US$1,500 to US$3,000) is worked out with the victim and your liability insurance isn’t going to help you.

Nicaraguan drivers are very horn-happy, even by Central American standards.

We could get our truck washed for less than US$3 but finding a car wash with a pressurized water gun was difficult.

Money, baseball, and other random observations

The La Prensa newspaper, whose publisher was killed in 1978 after a long career of criticizing Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza, refers to Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega as “the unconstitutional President” almost every single time he is mentioned in print.

Speaking of Daniel, as the Nicaraguan president chummily refers to himself, his FSLN party recently got a re-branding at the hand of Rosario Murillo, the woman he secretly married then publicly married. Murillo, who is the government’s spokesperson and is with Ortega at nearly every appearance, is a fascinating character – like a cross between Stevie Nicks, a voodoo mistress, and your long-lost crazy Latin aunt. Anyway, she thought the FSLN’s traditional black and red color scheme was too aggressive and in 2011 she swapped it for the color pink and tossed in peace signs and hearts for good measure. You will still see the random light pole or roadside rock sporting the old red and black bands, but most FSLN campaign message are now cheery and rosy, like the one below.

The ruling party recently re-branded from red and black to hot pink.

Baseball is huge in Nicaragua. It’s the official national sport (not soccer) and there are currently four Nicaraguans playing in the US Major Leagues. Extremely popular Sunday games are played as double headers but with only seven innings in each game as we learned when we caught a baseball game in Nicaragua.

Baseball is even bigger than soccer in Nicaragua.

Though Nicaragua is the second poorest nation in the Americas (behind Haiti) we saw less evidence of homelessness, hunger, begging, or shanties here than we did in Guatemala or Honduras.

You need to show your passport when you change money at banks, though there are official, regulated, legal money changers on the streets who carry don’t require your passport and often give a slightly higher rate.

Electricity and water regularly cut out in Nicaragua. If you can’t work around that, make sure your hotel has a functioning power and water backup system. Many do.

1,000 córdoba bills from the Sandinista administration are out of circulation and worthless though coyote money changers may still try to give them to you. Don’t accept them unless you want a valueless souvenir.

Debit cards do work at ATMs. You just have to try a different Bank. I was in Nicaragua in 2013 and quickly worked out at which bank my ATM debit card worked. I carried two cards and each only worked at different banks (something about the bank network they are associated with). One card was from a large bank and the other is from a smaller credit union.
My family has been back recently and reported no problems with using ATMs.